


the stars are calling

by birdsandivory



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Established Relationship, Fluff and Humor, Honeymoon, Keith and Shiro's Romantic Adventures, M/M, Marriage, Mild Language, Palm Reading, SHEITH - Freeform, Star Gazing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-06
Updated: 2019-10-06
Packaged: 2020-10-10 20:55:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,131
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20534453
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/birdsandivory/pseuds/birdsandivory
Summary: Keith doesn't need a fancy honeymoon or a long, distant getaway — he's not that kind of guy.What he wants just hours after getting married is to go back to his roots and share with Shiro the sky.





	the stars are calling

**Author's Note:**

> Hello!
> 
> This is my piece for the Intertwined Zine! It's been a blast to work on this project and I'm happy to finally share this with you guys. My part of the zine was Keith and Shiro's honeymoon, which I was SUPER glad to write for, so I hope you all enjoy!!

Keith had missed it out here.

There’s a comforting nostalgia about the desert, miles from the Garrison and away from synthetic lights and the smell of books and machinery, nothing for him but the sky and the stars.

And Shiro.

It had been a last minute decision after saying ‘I do,’ just hijacking a hoverbike like old times and going anywhere, the man’s arms wrapped around him as he fake-chides in his ear about careless driving. But it was worth it, Keith thinks, now that they’re here. 

He shifts atop his splayed out bomber jacket, looking over at Shiro beside him, the cool wind rustling a dark forelock as he lies there with the softest smile. He’s suited for the moonlight, a gentle glow despite his sunshiney personality, comforting and an ever-present reminder that this is all there is. 

Shiro _ is _ the moon.

The heat of the giant star’s rays just isn’t him.

He’s a quieter, tender presence.

There’s a split second in which Keith wonders if the other had imagined something other than stargazing in the dunes — something more meaningful than waking up at 2 AM and running into the sand — to celebrate their first night married. It’s a dumb thought, and he’s worrying for nothing because Shiro’s so damn _ agreeable, _ but still. He can’t help but have a few uncertainties — a ‘what if’ this is just _ his _ vision?

The pilot catches him staring and his smile grows wider.

Maybe it’s nothing and that tick in his brain is just a part of his imagination.

He’s idly alternating between starwatching and the changing of his husband’s expressions. He wears them so openly before Keith, so easily shows him weaknesses others don’t have the privilege of viewing. But at the moment, those twisting lips — smiling, parting — are a weapon that renders him useless for more than stopping and staring. 

And Keith’s content with that.

...Shiro himself is in a world of his own.

There’s nothing greater than the moments he spends with the man he now shares a last name with and he favors this quiet time with everything they collectively love above them, shining so perfectly in the blackness of the dead night. It fills him with a purpose he can’t quite explain.

“I forgot how small the world feels out here,” Keith finally says, hands cradling his head as he looks up at the stars, his rolling eyes counting constellations with every rise and fall of his chest. Shiro can’t agree because the open dunes make _ him _ feel like the Earth has opened up — telling him _ he’s _the speck amongst the colossus. And he tells Keith just that, in a way.

“We’re in a vast, empty desert and the world is small?”

A wandering hand reaches up, pointing at a sea of stars.

“The sky seems so much bigger now.”

Shiro can see his point when he looks up at the swath of gold flecks casting light across the sky, Keith’s fingertips tickling the air above them, and if he closes his palm — he thinks the man would be able to capture the cosmos.

“Yeah, I guess you’re right.” He pulls his gaze from above to the pilot beside him, screaming violets focused on anything and everything surrounding them. Shiro smiles softly, giving his own seldomly divided attention to the shack a ways away — memories dancing in his mind like old, dusty mementos. “It’s kind of nice, you know. Being here feels like we’re back where we started.”

“Only this time, we’re married,” Keith says proudly.

Shiro laughs at that, reaching over to take the other’s hand, their fingers entwining — fitting like missing puzzle pieces. “We are.”

He stares at their joined palms as if their tender lines would tell him the world’s secrets, the way he thumbs over rough knuckles and traces a smooth gold band like stars mapping to the west, a quiet conversation slipping through hidden river trails and dotting coordinates like constellations.

The entire gesture in that moment gives him the silliest idea.

“Want me to read your palm?”

Keith looks at him skeptically, as if he broke the atmosphere and he’s almost apologetic for it. “Like one of those flea market psychics?”

Shiro is a little flustered at the comparison and he guesses that Keith does have a valid argument, but no matter how sketchy the oddity, he wants the other to believe him long enough to make what he has to say count.

Even if it is only on a whim.

“Hey, there’s a science to it,” he counters.

The pilot raises a brow, probably still a bit on the fence about the validity of his statement, but he indulges the idea for what it’s worth. Keith sits up after a moment, crossing his legs and shifting about until he deems himself comfortable, holding out a hand that Shiro’s all too willing to take.

“Okay, I’ll bite. Go ahead.”

Shiro purses his lips, furrowing his brows in faux-concentration and he catches his husband mimicking the expression. It’s comical, cute even, and he’s almost too interested in what’s going through the man’s mind as he walks his fingers across Keith’s palm. Blatantly ignoring the way his husband is looking at him — now so cheeky — he clears his throat, speaking matter-of-factly, index in the air before he pokes at one of the strikes across pale skin.

“This is your head line.”

“Ahuh.”

“Hey, this is serious business.” He tries to sound mock-offended, but maybe he’s not as good at it as some of their more animated friends, not that the other seems to mind. 

Cool laughter fills the air, melodic as the twinkling of the expanding and contracting celestial energy above them, and Shiro feels closer to the stars than ever. “Okay, I’m listening.”

Keith watches his husband with unabashed amusement.

Shiro taps the middle of his palm, looking up from beneath dark lashes, and Keith preens at the attention — even as the man simpers his way.

“Hm,” he begins with a teasing lilt, “says you’re a little on the reckless side.”

Brows shooting up, the Garrison pilot is surprised at the accusation and he’s a little offended, the only thing the other could be referring to is, “if this is because I forgot to fill the hoverbike’s gas tank earlier—”

“Hey, it’s your palm saying this, not me.” Shiro replies, but there’s no stern tone or seriousness, just gentle, thoughtful words. “And it says you’re smart, gifted, talented.” The more he speaks, the more Keith notices the blush of his cheeks, the burning red at the tips of his ears and the tightness of his tone. And he’s undeniably charmed to see that Shiro still gets so worked up over something as small as complimenting him. 

“Oh, yeah?” His voice is playful because he wants more, because he’ll never get tired of hearing the other talk about him like he’s so much greater than anything he never thought he’d be.

“Absolutely.”

It’s... good.

“All of that just by looking at my hand?” It sounds silly, unbelievable, really — but he doesn’t mind entertaining Shiro’s game, so long as he gets to poke his fun. 

“It’s not like I didn’t know it, but now it’s for sure.”

Keith takes the look Shiro shoots his way, soft and loving, with a swallow and a shy frown — avoiding those brown eyes as he reaches up with a free hand to rub at the red in his cheeks. His husband only tugs at the one in both of his to catch his attention, sporting a humored grin, and Keith can only scoff. “You’re such a cheese.”

Shiro shrugs.

For a moment, he remembers the stars, the sole purpose for dragging his partner out of the house at an ungodly hour in the first place. They’re bright, casting lights in the sky when he looks up, hovering over them like rain clouds with the intention of sprinkling nothing upon them but the stardust they’re made of. And when Shiro next speaks, it’s as if his voice is music falling from the milky way, sweet on his lips.

“Now, this,” he drags his words like he drags his fingers, wiggling against Keith’s palm that laughs him into a protesting _ ‘hey!’ _ “This is your life line.”

“Hm?” He hums, playing along as well as he can, even if he does think it ridiculous. His husband’s antics are ever changing, though, and he has to appreciate that unpredictability. “What’s it say?”

“Long, for sure.” And Keith rolls his eyes at Shiro’s way of reminding them both that they’ll definitely die of old age and not piloting accidents.

“All hands look the same, though. And not everyone’s life is long.”

“I only care about your hands, though.” He emphasizes the phrase with soft, lingering touches, thumbs both flesh and metal smooth across his skin. “And your life.”

Keith only shakes his head.

“And that one?” He points to a deep groove crossing straight across his palm, and the man across from him regards his hand with a sigh and the tilt of his head.

“Your heart line.” Shiro squints, leaning down as if there are words writ upon Keith’s flesh that will tell him all he needs to know. “It says...”

“What?” Keith challenges with a smirk. “What does it say?”

Shiro’s face is a perfect balance between serious and twitching humor. _“Very good choice._”

Keith has to shift where he sits, face hot, though he easily makes it seem like he’s unbothered by the line — delivering one of his own. “Well, that’s something I already knew.”

Shiro moves his finger across the planes of Keith’s open hand, tracing a deep-rooted line between his index and middle, following the trail all the way to the bottom edge of his thumb. “And now, this is your fate line... wait. I mean — your life line?”

Narrow eyes squint to slits.

“Was that a question?” Keith asks, raising a brow skeptically. “I thought you looked at my life line.”

“No! Yes. Yes, I did... Definitely your fate line.” Shiro makes a face of his own at the other’s disbelieving hum, but he doesn’t seem to let it discourage him from the plan, tenderly brushing the man’s palm with his fingertips before more confidently saying, “and with it, I’m going to read your future.”

Keith inclines his head thoughtfully and Shiro makes a show of staring at his hand like it’s the eighth World Wonder.

“Are you sure that’s how this works?”

Shiro likes the surprise in Keith’s face then.

He sighs heavily, a bit theatrical, but it’s worth it to see such laughter in his husband’s violet eyes. “Do you want to know what I see or not?”

It takes a while for Keith to stop looking at him so seriously, but when he does, it’s with the ghost of a smile and a shake of his head. “_Yes._”

If Shiro’s honest, he didn’t quite think Keith would play along so well or as long as he has, and with what little knowledge he has of something as eccentric as _ palm reading _ (a Chinese custom, a bit of a stretch for his cultural background), he simply does his best to continue the charade — memorizing the curve of a smaller hand. He glides across the expanse of tender flesh, relishing in the steady heartbeat beneath his fingertips as he thumbs the line of a thin wrist.

And somewhere along the way, Keith’s amused staring be damned, he finds the words, “I see... a little girl in your future.” 

He hears the pilot’s breath catch, and he knows that they've decided it just the day before, that it's written in the stars — starting a family — they want nothing more than that.

But this moment feels...

“In _ our _ future?” The question is timid for the Keith Kogane he remembers; it’s full of a thoughtfulness, a mindful sigh wafting sweetly from his lips. 

The look they share steals Shiro’s breath, too, because his better half has a way about him that evokes all emotion even when he refuses to show any of his own — violet eyes smiling though he looks to be battling a lump in his throat. 

“In our future.” Shiro answers and his husband lets out a hiss through his teeth, a smile on his face as he moves to pull back his hand. Shiro doesn’t let him, though, only grins as he tightens his grip. Keith stays where he is, watching as contemplative nuances accompany synthetic fingers. “Could be a little boy, too. Whatever they are — two arms and two legs, guaranteed.”

A loud ‘pfft’ makes him snort, and Shiro watches as a scarred face turns red, body scooting in close until their knees are pressed together.

Keith’s fingers wrap around his own, holding tightly.

“Tell me more.”

**Author's Note:**

> "Just as a pebble thrown into the water creates ripples, so our thoughts create similar effects on our palms." —Michael Scotts


End file.
